I remember when my Junior One semester was over and I was
coming back from my apartment in SF for my 6 week winter break, I just knew as
an intuition, that if something was going to happen, it was going to happen
before I came back for my Junior Two semester. Either something bad would
happen during break or if Lucky made it through my winter break, she would be
with me for some time until the older years of a dog’s life, with the exception
of just having one bad leg and being diagnosed with cancer.
Approximately two weeks into break, on Monday, December 24th,
2012, my mom was complaining of trouble urinating. We suspected it was a
Urinary Tract Infection. My brother and I drove our mom to the hospital. I
remember Lucky sitting in her spot in the kitchen corner, and I gave my sister
the responsibilities to give Lucky the scheduled, immune-enhancing and
anti-tumor supplemental modalities we were giving Lucky according to the plan
we had layed out for her from Dr. Eisen’s book. This trip to the ER room just
made me feel uncomfortable about everything that had been going on. It was just
another thing of all the stress I was holding up. My mom was given some
medications and things were fine.
Wednesday, December 27th, 2012 was the first day
of the end days as some would say, or as I believe, the beginning of preparing
to send her back to The Source and everyone and everything’s true home. I
refrain from the word, God, not out of disrespect by any means, but because God
in many people’s eyes is personified into this all-mighty individual sitting up
in his throne ready to judge you. This is not at all the case of what Dolores
Cannon has found but to spare the controversy, I merely used the term, The Source,
as Dolores has put it. I remember the afternoon of whichever date it was. By
Thursday, the end days had begun for sure. I can still see it clearly, Lucky
sitting in her corner of the kitchen that is crowded by the kitchen island
(table), refusing to get up. At least it seemed that she was refusing to get
up. Being in her corner, there was not enough space for me to do any real
assessment. All I could do was hope she was just being lazy and did not want to
get up. After time went by, and seeing her not even move to change the way she
was positioned, deep down, I knew something was awry. This was not like her,
even after her diagnosis. Her reluctance to move was abnormal and out of the
ordinary. I remember trying to move the cushions she was laying on to see if
she needed some help to get up. We pulled her cushions out of the crammed
kitchen corner, and tried to get her up, to no avail. We weren’t sure what was
going on, but it certainly was not reassuring. As I write this, part of me
wants to remember what happened exactly so I can document it as it happened.
But my memory on this is unclear, and it’s probably best it stayed that way
because the days that will follow are some emotionally tough days. I remember
receiving a text on Wednesday, from a good friend of mine inquiring if I could
play basketball the next day as one of his friends from college was coming to
play. I never responded, which gives me thinking that this new issue Lucky had
started on Wednesday. On Wednesday, I also bought some slip resistant mats,
which also leads me to believe that she was having trouble standing on
Wednesday and not Thursday. So I never responded to my friend’s text on
Wednesday. The following is our text conversation which has been slightly
edited for showing purposes:
Me: “Probably not man, didn’t sleep well.”
Thursday, December 27, 2012, 11:17 AM
Him: “Lol that’s a terrible excuse”
11:36 AM
Him: “Neither did I, I slept at 3, woke up at 8, slept again
till 10”
11:37 AM
Him: “Don’t be *lazy. Come play”
11:37 AM
Him: “My friend from ______ said 3 of his friends bailed so
it’s just him and 2 others and the rest of us (a couple names)”
11:56 AM
Me: “I’ll have to think about it. If so, when and where?”
12:03 PM
Him: “_____ at 1. What’s there to think about? Don’t use the
sleep excuse lol it’s the worst excuse ever lol”
12:06 PM
Me: “Oh wow. That’s early. Earliest ever, I think.”
12:08 PM
Him: “Yea it’s earlier”
12:09 PM
Him: “I texted you about it yesterday too though remember?”
12:10 PM
Me: “So how many total?”
12:11 PM
Him: “I think 8 if you and _(my brother)_ come.”
12:26
Him: “Can you?”
12:38 PM
Him: “How about 1:30?”
12:39 PM
Me: “Alright”
12:41 PM
I remember where I was and what state of mind I was in when
I responded to these texts. I was incredibly stressed. Stressed to the point
where I felt an escape when going out to buy food to eat. I was at Subway and I
remember reclining the seat in the car and thinking to myself about how I felt.
I felt more of a relief being outside of the home and outside from the
situation. I remember looking up at the blue skies, yet not enjoying the view
of miles up. A view that normally inspires me about nature, grandeur, and
thinking to myself how high up Mount Everest must be, I did not enjoy these
thoughts when they entered my consciousness. I felt somewhat guilty for,
honestly, preferring this moment of being outside, temporarily away from the
situation. Every time I entered home, I would always check to see if Lucky had
gotten up by herself and moved, only to find that she has barely moved. I was
beyond worried at this point because I knew if she was not going to the
bathroom, we had an immediate crisis on our hands.
I want to temporarily address the conversation I posted
here. I posted the conversation here because it serves as a marking point and
significant event in the turn of events of this entire nightmare that started in
August. When I was outside Subway, and saw these texts my friend had sent me,
which believe me, he is not like that at all, I did not feel angry. What I did
feel was the predominant feeling of “I’ve got to get Lucky to get up, or we all
know where this is headed”. This feeling of desperation and deep down, a
feeling of her returning back to God was right around the corner. I felt
platonic to my friend’s insistence and perhaps from an outsiders third-party’s
perspective, insensitive and despicable. I felt platonic generally speaking
because he did not know about Lucky’s recent change in status. He knew that
Lucky was diagnosed with cancer. He himself has a golden retriever, also named
Lucky, and from knowing him with time, I knew he was not being insensitive to
the situation purely because he did not know about the recent turn in Lucky’s
status. I did not tell him, so how could he know? I do remember thinking to
myself that I could really be blowing up a fuse from his apparent insistence
and ignorance, but I could not blame him. It wasn’t his fault that Lucky
developed cancer. From all the learning and soul-searching that I did during
this time and even before all this happened from Dolores Cannon’s work, I knew
if there was someone to blame, it was myself. For I failed to be responsible
for Lucky. I failed to make sure she was getting the best quality food, water,
exercise, and lifestyle. I never seriously took the time like I do now with all
these articles that I write to see if Lucky was meeting the standard of care.
Sure the fact that dog food companies can sell horrible, low-grade quality food
to pets is despicable and irresponsible! Do not get me wrong, they are absolutely
a huge problem, but I could have cared enough to check up and learn about the
quality of food I was feeding my dog. So although I very well could have been
angry at my friend for being seemingly insensitive to what was going on, I
wasn’t. The unfavorable realization that this was seriously going downhill was
apparent in the back of my mind.
And as one can see, I did decide to go “play” basketball. I
remember feeling like I needed to be there for Lucky if she needed help
standing to go to the bathroom. But I remember my parents “telling” me to go
out and play because there was nothing I could do about it at the time. I was
waiting anxiously to hope that she would get up and go use the bathroom. Having
fun by playing basketball was the farthest thing from my mind. Heh. Ironic as a
somewhat insightful thought just came to me, and it’s the connection that I
used to choose to have fun by playing basketball over Lucky’s exercise and
playtime and now, having fun was the farthest thing from my mind. I did not
care one bit, and this was true all while I played. I remember when I got
there, I remember getting there late, and my other friends that I play ball
with whom are constantly late, were already there shooting around. I remember
walking up to them, not saying anything and with no real discernible emotion on
my face. I said hi to my friend and the two others gave a smile and asked in an
inquisitive yet slightly teasing tone of voice, “so, didn’t sleep well huh?”
indicating incredulity, probably expecting me to smile and give a “caught in
the act” response to their joke. I did what felt natural to do. I simply kept
my distance to not warrant a further question from them, looked up, nodded my
head down with a small sigh, and looked straight ahead, experiencing the
reminder of the situation at hand. They were amply competent at reading my body
language and facial expressions as they all caught on nearly instantly that
something was amiss. One of them asked, “wait, no, really, is everything ok?”,
to which I looked away and did not give a response to, not out of wanting to be
rude, but out of the potentially overwhelming stress of the situation while not
wanting to be vulnerable with someone who did not already know what was going
on. I could tell in a split second that my good friend deciphered my non-verbal
response to my other friend’s question, and knew Lucky’s condition had gone
downhill. My good friend’s college friends played competitively, and I know
that if I was not in that stressed state of mind, I would have competed with a
lot more energy than I did. I felt completely uninspired to try. Every time I
caught the ball, energy seemed to drain from my body, and while running up and
down the court, I would be thinking about the triviality of the game. How could
people care so much over a game? My dog is in pain, things aren’t going well,
and I’m supposed to care if the ball goes through a hoop? Thoughts of
comparison between myself with that of my friend’s college friends came to my
mind, but I could not care. How could I care? I remember looking at the
farthest horizon, toward some mountains, and jogging up and down the court
intermittently, then looking at my brother and indicating that this could not
make an impression on me. We were both very low on motivation to play the game.
I remember making a shot with the thought of “who cares?” percolating
throughout my mind and body. After we were done playing ball, my friend asked
if my brother and I wanted to spend some time with a couple of our basketball
friends at his house to play a board game, which is something that has never
happened before. I felt appreciative because he tacitly understood that I could
use the company, and to be honest, as the way I felt waiting outside of Subway,
I felt less stressed being outside of my home and being away from the
situation. It’s very mixed feelings as I simultaneously felt guilty for wanting
time to distract myself from what was happening at home, but at the same time,
just the fact that I could get away, was something that I my soul was aching
for. My friend told me that I could meet at his house a little later, after we
had showered. I don’t remember exactly what happened – I’m glad I don’t – but I
didn’t make it to his house.
Him: “Hey my mom said we can play here. Wanna come over
around 5:50 till like 9?”
Thursday, December 27th, 2013, 5:05 PM
Him: “Hey did you get my text?”
5:32 PM
Me: “Yea, I’m thinking”
5:33 PM
Him: “Ok”
5:38 PM
Him: “Not coming?”
8:22 PM
I didn’t respond until the next day. I believe I remember
what happened Thursday night. My brother and I were in the backyard. We were
manually trying to get Lucky to stand up and go to the bathroom as she had not
urinated since this ordeal began. I remember previously yelling at my mom in
response to what I thought was an insensitive comment. “If she doesn’t get up
and pee, we all know where this is headed!” We were all exasperated. We tried
helping her up again, to no avail. I watched futilely as she just seemed to
struggle to stand up for whatever reason. Be it muscle weakness, balance
issues, or a combination, she ended up on the ground. I remember it being dark,
except for our backyard light that was on. It was a clear night. I let out a
long sigh. I remember saying to my brother quietly, privately, and hesitantly,
“Hey, I think we need to go for a walk.”
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